A bibliography of English military books up to 1642 and of ...

"postures," " His Excellencies Booke" fs named as the standard. The rest
refers to the drill of Pikemen, and to the exercising and arming of the
Infantry generally, and of the Cavalry, who are divided into Cuirassiers, and
Harquebusiers and " Dragons " ; the tv/o terms seeming interchangeable.^
Artillery, Viz.
100. Sixteen-twenty-four. Norton, Robert.
Of The Art
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Of Great
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The Explanation
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of the most excellent and necessary Defi-
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nitions, and
I
Questions, pronounced and propoun-
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ded, by that rare Souldier
and Mathematician, Thomas
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Digges Esquire ; and by him
published, in his
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tiaticos, and Pantometria, concerning
great |
Ordinance, and his Theorems
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thereupon.
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Together,
With certaine Expositions, and an-
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swers thereunto adioyned
: I
Written by Robert
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Norton Gunner.
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And by him
Dedicated, to the Worshipfull John
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Reinolds Esquire, Master
Gunner
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of England.
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London,
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Printed by Edw: Allde, for
yohn Tap, and are to bee sold at
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his Shop, at the corner of Saint
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Magnus Church. |
1624.
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Quarto.
Collation.
A2.—Pref., A3.—R.H. :
Copies.
Tp., A i.—Ded. to John Reinolds, Master Gunner of England,
" Ofthe Art of Great Artillery."—Sigs. in 4% A-G.
B.M.
Contents. Norton succeeded Reinolds as Master-Gunner. This treatise
ansv^^ers certain questions on gunnery propounded by Digges in the " Stratioticos"
and "Pantometria", books with u^hich the present should be read;
Digges had answered the questions merely by a " yes " or " no."
Norton's
work is interesting as giving the results of several experiments he had made
for ascertaining the range of artillery. His conclusion is that the maximum
range is to be obtained with an elevation of a little over 40°. A serious
charge of plagiarism is brought against him by Malthus [No, 118], who states
that though Norton calls his later work, " The Gunner ", original, he has
done no more than translate Ufano's book, transposing the parts
and adding
seven figures, taken from Thybourel, to those already given by the Italian
writer; and Eldred ("Gunner's Glasse," London, 1646, 4°) is equally severe.
^
Markham, in the " Decades ", describes this arm briefly. Dragoons were a kind of
mounted infantry, and received their name from the weapon with which they were
armed, a short gun or blunderbuss, called a " dragon," from the ornamentation on its
muzzle. They were first raised about 1600 by the Mar^chal de Brisac.
So